Blog #8: Social classes

I suppose society is wonderfully delightful. To be in it is merely a bore. But to be out of it is simply a tragedy – Oscar Wilde

I know a few people (myself included) who love to think that we do not belong in any class; and we have a hobby of looking with curiosity at how other people behave in the context of class. But I kid myself; it is a very classed society. Growing up, no time was the matter of social stratification starkly visible than during mass on Christmas mornings. It was a village affair, and everyone had to attend. The well-to-do who work in the big cities would troop to the home villages to flaunt their wealth to simple village folk. This was 20 years ago, and it has only gotten worse; my kid brother, who knows a ton about vehicle models, and I would play a game every holiday and try to guess who else will show up during the next holiday with a top-of-the-rage vehicle based on what latest model we see in the village and we would be right every time.

People like us

The video People Like Us talks about the ways in which Americans class themselves and how their perceptions and expectations shape people for generations. The importance of anticipatory socialization is underlined in two clips that talk about trying to fit in to upper classes e.g the woman who undergoes training because she wants to nab a rich man, and the belles in the high school who are being trained to belong to a special clique. As the clip set in Hampton’s NY shows, even after going through hell trying to move up the social class ladder, it is still not easy to seamlessly look the part and swim with the rich people. This is in part because people in higher classes can afford to socially close themselves from other people thereby making belonging very hard. A simple Google search of the word uppity revealed interesting results for me a minute ago. I did not know it has a racial connotation when used on an African-American! It really shows the importance of looking at where race and class intersect – black people in higher classes are not viewed the same way as white people in that same class.

Explaining global inequality.

Globalization is being spearheaded by corporations. Corporations are owned by a few individuals who are out to make profit; and they take advantage of developing countries endless cheap labor and markets. The need for work means that people are willing to any job that pays even if the work conditions are not favorable. That is why there are sweatshops around the globe.  A population with money spends it on basic needs, and if there is a surplus, people indulge in luxury goodies.

Early this year, Kenya elected its fourth president. A month before people hit the ballot; we had two presidential debates (oh yes we borrowed pres. debates), it was the first time I had of the idea of ‘improving the economy by growing the middle class’ in the Kenyan political rhetoric. It is already a pretty consumerist country but now the desire fuelling consumption is now going to be that of trying to look the ‘middle class’ part. It is neocolonialism at best.

Media Magic: Making Class Invinsible

This article talked about how the media portrays the different classes. Everyone is in the middle class, the poor do not exist, if there are poor people then there are not doing enough to get out of poverty, or they are out of their luck (especially around christmas time and with regards to white families). The upper class wealthier people also do not want attention drawn to their wealth, so they consider themselves as middle class. It reminds of a story I read about one of the bosses at FOX who considers himself poor and oppressed by the liberal media.